Construction Started on Sheraton Hotel in Ventura

VENTURA — Construction has started on the $22.5-million Sheraton Ventura Hotel on a 6.6-acre site at Harbor Boulevard and Monmouth Bay.

Expected to be completed next March, the 285-room hotel is owned by Tiverton Properties of Ventura. The group includes Charles McCune of the architectural firm of McCune, Gerwin and Partners Inc. of Los Angeles, and Ventura County residents Wallace Brown, J.P. Dufau, David Petit, Raymond Swift, Ida Swift and Paul Gerwin.

The hotel will provide a 6,000-square-foot grand ballroom for large meetings and social events, a junior ballroom, and four executive meeting rooms. It will feature a cafe and a lunch and dinner restaurant, a lobby lounge with sunken bar and a second cocktail lounge for nightly entertainment. Planned for an outdoor courtyard area are small lakes and streams, a swimming pool and spa and extensive lawn areas.

In addition to designing the buildings and landscaping, the architectural firm of McCune, Gerwin & Partners is providing construction services.

The contract for management has been given to Hospitality Management Corp., a subsidiary of the Dallas-based Registry Hotel Corp. HMC will be in charge of the overall supervision of the marketing, sales, operations, public relations and food and beverage services for the hotel, according to Peter Shelly, HMC's vice president, marketing.

The contract for the Ventura Sheraton is HMC's first within California.